Serge noticed the sweat on Kestrel's face, droplets forming at the tip of her chin. She casually wiped them off with the back of her hand.
"She's not having it easy either," Serge thought. "She's learning and growing."
When Kestrel fired the first shot, she missed the monster. The monster, an ugly human-like head, paused slightly before quickly fleeing. But by the second shot, the monster's movements became strangely slow and clumsy, as if its brain had suddenly become muddled, and Kestrel's bullet hit it squarely. By the third shot, the monster was completely frozen, a live target, and Kestrel blew away half of its head.
In just three shots, she learned how to invade the monster's mind in an instant. In such a short time, she learned how to seize an enemy, to influence its actions. Her ability to learn amid such chaos was terrifying.
"What kind of person would she have been if she hadn't grown up in the Tower?" The thought flickered through Serge's mind.
